Kids Club Torture?

So I took the girls to the gym today to play in the Kids Club while I worked out. Lola is totally fine with this, but Elise....well...let's just say not so much. I was called over the loudspeaker to come to the Kids Club about 35 min. into my workout. I walked in to find Elise hysterical and Lola just playing and having a good old time. They told me they had tried to call me a while ago, but I didn't hear them.

so, WHAT DO I DO? Resign myself to try to fit in gym time around the schedule of my workaholic husband? Or do I keep taking her and hope she eventually "gets used to it"?
Argh! It felt pretty bad when I picked up my little crying mess of baby...I don't relish doing that again....

help!

Anthony

I actually got to talk to my cousin on the phone this morning and that was great! He sounded awesome, which I was not expecting so soon after the accident. As of this morning, the doctors still haven't started his facial reconstruction, but hopefully, he went into surgery today. You can tell he's anxious to get home and get on with healing there, but he was AMAZINGLY upbeat and positive. I told him it made my day to talk with him...I think he is going to be just fine, after all! I want to help somehow, but I don't know what to do.

updates on everything

Anthony: He actually walked around the ICU the other day and ate some pureed food. His surgeries are scheduled to commence tomorrow, barring any unforeseen delays.

Me: Suffice to say, Friday was a rough day, probably the roughest my marriage has ever had to withstand so far. To this point, I've never doubted the foundation and strength of my marriage, but the events leading to Friday really put those to the test. I was nervous for the first time in the 10+ years that we've been together.
The end of the day proved to have a positive outcome, but it took a lot of soul-searching and honesty to get there. I'm so glad this happened, as I feel we are even stronger now than ever before.
Dan: Poor Dan. The Chargers lost and he is so sad. He actually took it way better than I anticipated. He is such a sports guy and it's one of those things that I'll kinda support, but never really get into. Unless we're talking hockey....
Lola: she is fabulous. just fabulous.
Elise: also fabulous and ridiculously happy to be home.

A side note: I have eaten so much garlic tonight, I doubt I'll be able to lie down for at least a few more hours due to the wicked garlic-induced heartburn I've brought upon myself. For the football game today I made tapenade, canellini bean with kale spread and artichoke bruschetta toppings. All with loads of garlic. I'm permeating garlic out of my pores.

Green Tomato Pie??? What?

yes, my thoughts exactly!

I was looking for recipes for green tomatoes since I had some in my CSA box recently. I wanted to know what else I could do besides fried green tomatoes and so I found this. As skeptical as I was, I gave it a try. Someone who have reviewed the recipe and had given it 4 stars, said that it was quite similar to apple pie and that the tomatoes actually taste like tart green apples in this recipe.

I happened to have some green apples on hand anyway, and not enough green tomatoes to do the recipe so I mixed it half apples and half tomatoes. It was basically an apple pie recipe so I imagine you should be able to use whatever your favorite apple pie recipe is and just substitute the apples for tomatoes or mix them together like I did.

The verdict? DEEEEE-LISH!

Family Stuff...

There's some crap going on with a family member and I can't even blog about it so I will secretely seethe instead. Everyday it seems that there is new crap to add to the pile of existing crap. It's too bad.

ANTHONY UPDATE: I heard from my aunt and she says Anthony is pretty concious now, but suffered a bump in the recovery road when a lung collapsed yesterday. The doctors were able to restore his lung, but because he is not able to breathe on his own yet, delayed the pending facial reconstruction that was supposed to start.
Once the thingy (sorry don't know what it's called) was removed from his throat he attempted to speak and he demanded to go home. He doesn't remember the accident and doesn't know why he's there and why he is restrained to the bed. It seems he was rather pissed off, very understandably.

more later....

NYC...signing off

We are back home, finally! To see the photos, click here.

I will absolutely need to go back to NYC at least a dozen more times to see more. I think next time we will stay in the upper west side, close to central park. Even though this trip was probably the most stressed I've been in my life, I still really want to back.
But we will wait till the kids are older next time. Definitely!

Update on Anthony

Anthony is in a medically-induced coma and the doctors wake him up every hour to check his cognitive reactions. They will ask him if he's able to hear them, can he move his fingers, etc...he responds appropriately. My aunt had not yet witnessed this until yesterday. She was in the room as the doctors brought him to and they told her to talk to him. She said she loved him and Anthony nodded! Out of lack of knowing what else to say, she also told him the Chargers won yesterday (Anthony is a huge fan) and he lifted his hand and index finger to say "number 1"! That was a very emotional moment for everyone. It was a first very positive sign.

There is still lots of swelling and bleeding on his brain but they think sometime soon they will begin reconstructive surgery on his face. I won't go into detail about the facial fractures, but they are pretty severe.

I cannot imagine how my overwhelmed and devestated my aunt must feel. It's a mother's worst nightmare. The accident itself took place maybe about 150-200 miles from where they live, which sucks on the one hand because he was air-lifted to a hospital that is almost a 2 hour drive for my aunt, but the upside is that this particular hospital is probably one of the best in California for head trauma. Thankfully, she is also able to stay with a friend who lives only 45 min away from the hospital so she won't have to drive so much.

Sad News

You know when you get a phone call at 6:30 am, it's rarely good news. My aunt called me to tell me that her son, my cousin, was in a horrible car crash on Saturday night and have to be life-lined to the hospital. He is stable now, but in critical condition in the ICU.
He has several fractures in his face, a severely bruised lung, blood on the brain with tremendous swelling, and he has had head reconstruction. These will be rechecked in about two days once the swelling goes down and they bring him out of sedation.

He is only 18. I'm praying he will be ok.

wild ride, this last 24 hours!

We are 4 for 4 as far as bad nights go, sheesh! But, let me give you the whole picture, it's been a crazy past 24 hours, mostly in a good way....
The rents stayed home with the sleeping kids, so Dan and I went out. This would be so much better with photos, hmmm. Oh well, I forgot my phone cable so I guess the photos will have to wait till Monday. Anyway, I digress. We found a really neat asian restaurant (I say "asian" because there were so many different styles represented on the menu...from thai to dim sum!). We were the only customers in there because, at 9:30 pm, it seems it was still early for New Yorkers to eat dinner on a Friday night. The place was called Incredi. The food was fantastic and the service could not have been better. The staff were so attentive, but not in that annoying way that can be sometimes! We had dim sum with sake! ha! We ate like kings and when we got our check, our server told us that he knocked off 20% for no particular reason, just because he liked us! The bill was only $50!

We decided to find a place to get a drink. No shortage of places around here! On every corner, there's an Irish pub, at least! We passed some snooty-looking clubs, but that's so not our scene so we found a small bar that looked pretty cool called Maker's. Little did we know how cool it really was! Our bartender, Chris, chatted with us all night. He was way fun and kept buying us rounds too!

All was within stumbling, er, I mean, walking distance to the apartment. When we got home, though, the girls both woke up and just would not go back to sleep. I stayed up with them all night, until about 6 am!

On another note, Elise has eaten so many crayons on this trip, I'm sure she will be pooping in technicolor soon.

mind over matter

No sooner than when I wrote my last post that the energy in this apartment totally changed for the better. Elise woke up from a long nap in a great mood and has been happy ever since! Even Lola is calm and minding. I spent the afternoon coloring and playing with the girls (I didn't have a key, everyone took off with a key and left me with none! the doors here automatically lock behind you so there was no way to leave without a key!), but that's ok because, not only was it totally rainy, but I think the girls and I needed a calm day of just recharging. We napped and played and everyone was happy again. Dan got home from his meeting around 4 pm and we took the girls for a nice walk. We found the coolest restaurant so far. It caters to kids too, which makes it that much more awesome. Kid-friendly restaurants have, so far, been proven to be a rare find around here. Maybe it's just this neighborhood

Tonight the rents are going to stay in while Dan and I go out. The girls will be asleep before we leave. We are just going as far as we can by foot, so close enough to come back quickly if we have to. Some sushi and sake 'sans enfants' sounds good to me.

More later!

Ok, I'm trying really hard not to complain, but...

Another rough night for us. Elise woke up twice, once for 1.5 hours and the other for 45 min. It took me bouncing her on my back in the ergo while watching tv at 3 am to get her to go back to sleep. She has been quite miserable this whole trip. Then, Lola woke up at 4:30 am vomiting. I don't know what happened there. She is fine today and hasn't puked again.
It's raining today so we were going to hit the Children's Museum of Art, but it took us all so long to get ready, with Elise crying all morning, I finally just put her down for a nap instead. So we are going to be in the apartment for most of the day, it looks like. Dan is in meetings today and my folks just took off exploring. I'm going to try to nap on the couch, if Lola will let me. I'm way sleep-deprived at this point. I'm beginning to wish we never came. So far, it doesn't seem worth all the grief. I haven't even seen anything yet and we've been here since Wednesday!

I'm sure it will get much better. The weekend should be nice and at least Dan will be free so we can go to Central Park and the Natural History Museum.

off to rest!

Quickie update...

I'm really trying to enjoy and appreaciate this trip, but it's been tough, mainly because if Elise is not nursing, she's crying. Very few moments in between! She's really having a rough time...not quite caught up on sleep, I think. She has cried so much today, intolerant of everything. Especially restaurants! Sadly, our apartment is so small that eating in is not much of an option either. I'm trying not to stress, but it's been challenging!
Dan had to go to a couple of meetings this morning so I ventured out with both kids. Lola in a stroller and Elise in my Ergo, we just went around the corner to the grocery store. We were a sight! People stared at our little mini-circus and I even got a comment from a guy that my 4 year old was way too old to be in a stroller! Huh! Imagine that, the city that has seen it all was quite perplexed with our little spectacle. One woman on the street said I looked like "an indiginous (sp?) person"! Ha!
We found a cool playground today and Lola had a blast there.
Both kids are asleep now and we are chilling with the rents. More tomorrow...we are planning to hit some hot shopping areas like soho and canal street.

Rockin' NYC!

This town is PRETTY COOL! The energy is so high and the architecture is so fantastic that you really don't notice the 'circa depression era' greyish colors. While the buildings may have that worn dull tint to them, the people more than make up for it with their vibrant shop signs and warm smiles. We have encountered nothing but sincerity and kindness...honestly, not at all what I was expecting. People here bend over backwards to help a stressed out mama trying to fit her stroller through restaurant or elevator doors!
We took a red-eye flight last night and I would not do that again if I had the chance. Red-eyes with our kids, at least, have proven time and again to NOT be good ideas. Suffice to say, neither kid nor parent slept on the plane, except for the last hour and 1/2 (Elise & Lola). So we made up some sleep by checking into a hotel room while we waited for the condo to be ready. By 1 pm it was ready and we headed on over. It's absolutely tiny, but still really cute! It's a nice little neighborhood. My dad and his girlfriend will be joining us tomorrow and stay through Sunday. It's seriously going to be tight in here. This place is SMALL! But it's only for 3 nights so I'm sure we can deal.
Tonight we did some recon with the kids and walked a few blocks diameter around the neighborhood to see what was around. We have everything we need within walking distance, including a whiskey bar! More on that tomorrow since I'm sure Dan and I will peruse as soon as my folks get here! ha!
We did find a really cool mexican restaurant on 2nd Ave., called Mexico Lindo. Food was awesome, as was the service. They were really cool about our kids (the only kids in the restaurant!) and catered to Lola to make her especially happy, which she was. Completely by herself, she ordered a bean burrito with no cheese and rice and beans. She asked if they could please not put cheese on her beans!
Dan had enchilades con camarones and they were chock full of shrimp. My plata combinacion had a combination of tacos, enchiladas and tamales. It was deeeeee-lish.
So was my margarita Donita!

More later and photos to follow when we get home since I left the cable there! drat!

Mama recharged the ol' batteries

As per my New Year's Resolution, I took time out for myself to do something fun. Last night I went out with the girls to this cool little bar. Dan was so proud of me for doing it, he thinks I don't get out enough. He's right! So I had me a nice little hall pass for the night! We had a blast and now I'm procrastinating making my way over to wannabehippie (who shall be referred to as Sneaky Camera Girl from now on) because, remembering the evil glint in her eyes, I just know she will have fantastically horrific photos posted as evidence of our good times.

So, we've decided we're going to be doing this once a month...why, oh why, didn't we think of this before???

haircut!

Dear Jess,

If you ever doubted how much you mean to me, please look back and remember that I posted 2 incredibly dorky self-portraits on the INTERNET just because you asked to see my new haircut. 'nuff said.

Love, Luci

Resolutions, Yaaaay or Naaaay?

Holy crap, I haven't blogged in a long time. There. Had to get that out first...now on to the subject at hand....

Resolutions! I've never done them before, although I do remember having to write some as a kid in school for some kind of assignment. I also remember that the resolutions were completely forgotton about as soon as my pen left the paper. So, would you say that to make a resolution(s) is an unrealistic aspiration? Are we doomed to forget all about our goals and hopes as soon as the novelty of the New Year is over? I'm thinking, yeah. Probably. But does that necessarily mean it's a bad idea? Why not write them, I say? Can't hurt! Maybe it's actually a good thing to define and clarify what your goals are based on your reflection of the past year. By defining the areas that need change and improvement, we can then reprioritize our time, money, attention, whatever. There ALWAYS room for improvement, right?
So this year I resolve to resolve! Ha!

1. Treat my body more respectfully. Feed it healthy food in healthy quantities. Excercise it.
2. Treat my mind and my heart. Air out stagnant emotions, take time for myself.

The common theme here, as you can see, is balance. Something that is seriously lacking in my life right now. But I'm hoping that with by achieving more balance via these 2 resolutions, I can thwart these unhealthy and unsightly negative habits that I've developed lately. Specifically, overeating, spending too much time at the computer and losing patience so quickly with Lola.
My wise acupuncturist/midwife/all around pal told me how important it was to encourage circulation in the body, both emotinally and physically. I don't pretend to understand Chinese Medicine or Qi, but I do see how the Chinese have a beautiful way of explaining balance and the symbolism is not only graceful, but incredibly logical. Spot on. It's amazing. Something I would definitely love to know more about.

In my very first attempt at the resolutions, I got acupuncture yesterday for the first time! Yes, the needles pinch a bit, but nothing that I couldn't handle. But how I felt afterwards made it so worth every little pinch and then some. I came out feeling goooooood. Completely relaxed. So relaxed, I wondered if I should have even been driving!

Then, in my second attempt at my resolutions, I got a haircut. This could feasibly be a WHOLE other post. I'm going to give you the short version (no pun intended).....BUTCHERED! ha! I kept asking the stylist to fix the area on the left side, because looking in the mirror, I could see clearly that the sides weren't even. Not in length or texture. The right side was shorter and very layered, the left side was longer and bluntly cut. It made the left side look huge. After she made several attempts to fix it, I decided it was good enough so I went home. Once I got home, I saw the cut in it's entirety and it was entirely awful! I tried to fix it myself, but couldn't get the back so I called my friend over today and she fixed it for me. It's actually pretty cute now, but way shorter than I had intended on going! That's ok. Secretly, I really wanted short hair anyway, but I thought I would make it gradually. Nope! ha ha! Anyway, all's well and I like it now.